“Pleasures with guilt” Part-11 Continues…..
“Who’s Jill?” I found myself asking, though I said it to myself.
“And I nearly allowed that to happen as well, even though I knew it wasn’t right. I allowed my own curiosity and temptation to get in the way of my reasoning, something I should never have ever done. I’m just glad it never went quite that far for one thing, because I now know, it can’t and never will.”
“I know that now too,” Jared told her. “Like I said…I think just because Jill reminded me so much of you, which is the reason why I even began thinking about it in the first place.”
“Ok, sorry for interrupting, but who is this Jill person anyway?”
“Jill Welsh, she was Jared’s first true love, and not just a passing fancy at the time either. They had known one another for years, they’d literally grown up together as kids. Bill and I seriously thought one day they would actually get married, when the time came.”
“But I screwed that one up too,” Jared said butting in. “We broke up my junior year of high school, which was again my own damn fault. I’d been pressuring Jill into having sex with me, something she had repeatedly told me she wasn’t ready for yet. We’d done other things of course by then, but mostly just mild petting, nothing serious. She wanted to wait, and asked me to do the same.
But I kept pressuring her more and more until she finally couldn’t handle the pressure any more, and broke up with me. Shortly after that, her parents transferred her to another high school, and then a short time after that, they even found a new place and moved away. I never saw, or spoke to her again after that. Anyway, I now know, because Jill did remind me so much of you, that not having her around anymore, I quite naturally began looking at you, as Jill.”
“Well, that explains a few things anyway,” I stated.
“So you see mom, this still didn’t have anything to do with anything you did…not really. I’d been dealing with my own guilt for a long time, thinking about you in ways that I shouldn’t have been in the first place. But now I know the reason why. So I’ve come to terms with that, and accepted that now.
You see…when I saw you sitting in the chair, saw the tears in your eyes falling, yet the love you still had for me as you did, as you sat there humiliating yourself in front of me. I saw not your face, but Jill’s. It was the same look she gave me just before we broke up. And then I realized, I was about to lose you…as my mother, the same way I lost her. Because of my own foolish pride, stupid illogical reasoning. And I knew then, in that moment…I had made a horrible, horrible mistake. And so again…for that, I am truly, truly sorry.”
“Well I’m just glad that we’ve somehow managed to make it here,” Sophia told him. “But…there’s no need for you to do anything rash, certainly not move out of the house, unless that’s something you still wish to do. Just do it for your own reasons, and not for the reasons you indicated earlier. I’d prefer it if you continued to live at home, at least for a while Jared. You’ll be moving out on your own soon enough as it is anyway.”
“So you don’t hate me then? Either of you?”
“Of course not,” Sophia and I said almost simultaneously. “Believe it or not Jared, we both love you. “Maybe things happened that now shouldn’t have, but the fact they did cannot change the way I now feel about you. But I for one, am glad that we’ve all come to our senses about this. You need to make your own decisions, have your own choices and not have anything forced upon you, no more than you tried to force yourself later upon us. In that…we were all wrong. But now hopefully, we’ve been given a new chance to set things right again. So, can we all agree on that? Forgive and forget as it were?”
“I can…if you guys will,” Jared stated, and then received a hug and a kiss from Sophia in response to that, and then from me. “Well, I still think I’m going to be heading back. I’ve already ruined a part of your weekend as it is. Maybe at least you can salvage the rest of it, and still have a little fun together.”
I saw Sophia’s eyes rise in surprise upon hearing that. “You’re ok with that? Still? After all this?”
Jared laughed. “Oh mom, give me a little credit anyway. You guys are friends, albeit close friends,” he snickered. “No…the thought of that doesn’t bother me at all, and frankly I’m glad that you can, that you do. But you are adults, responsible for yourselves, just as I now know that I am. So no, I say have fun, enjoy yourselves and quit worrying about what I think one way or the other about it, but more importantly, quit worrying about me. My time will come when it’s supposed to, and not before then.”
Jared stood up, preparing to leave. He glanced out across the pool area, and then froze. He looked as though he’d seen a ghost. And in a way…he had.
“What?” I said looking over in the direction he was, but didn’t comprehend what it was he was looking at. Though Sophia did.
“Oh my god!” She exclaimed suddenly sitting up, as Jared all but collapsed back down into his seat, his face having lost all color.
“What?” I repeated again.
“See that young attractive little blonde just sitting down in the lounge chair over there?”
“Yeah?”
“That’s Jill!” Sophia said, sounding almost out of breath.
“Well I’ll be damned,” I exclaimed just under my breath as I sat there looking at what appeared to be a younger image of my very best friend. “No wonder.”
**
We all sat there in silence watching the young woman as she spread out a towel on one of the pool lounge chairs preparing to lay back and catch some sun. I was a bit surprised when she reached back around behind herself, undoing the clasp on her top, letting it fall. Unlike Sophia, her breasts appeared more similar to my own in their size and shape, a nice full perky “B” cup, and perhaps a bit fuller than my own. But it was obvious that Jared was surprised when she did that, let alone surprised at just seeing her there after all this time.